Germans, Romans and a double defeat.

Spyros has always been proud of his collections of 20th Century and 21st Century figures.
World War Two? You bet.
Korean War? Check
Arab Israeli Wars? Yes
Rhodesian Bush wars? Of course.
Cold War and British Army on the Rhine? Jawohl!
Falkland Islands- yes both sides.
Afghanistan? Iraq? Yes and yes.
Drug cartels, modern black ops? ...shhh...but yes.

So when he rang me to tell me that he was doing Germans I was a bit perplexed.
"I know," I said, "I painted your Bundeswehr for you in the flecktarn camo."
"Not them. Ancient Germans. Tribesmen."
"Seriously? Why?"
'To fight my Romans."
"You have Romans???"

So that led to this post.

The German commander encourages his tribesmen

Oudenarde July 11th 1708 -- or an attempt at it anyway

 Well it was going to be a big one as the Brothers gathered.  For a variety of reasons there were less of us than originally planned. Ralph was the French CinC , Vendome, and Tom and Phil were his subordinates.

Ross played Marlborough ( I think Ross liked being referred to as 'Milord' or 'His Grace') and Spyros and Chris were his subordinates. 

The game was interesting as both sides were marching onto the field and had to jockey for position as each brigade had to shake out into line. Troops arrived on a predetermined plan - each commander had a good idea of the arrival of various brigades with some possible alteration. The battlefield had long lines of approaching troops!

View from the French side. Moving along the road-A Dragoon Brigade. Behind Infantry brigade with Irish, Royal Italians and Barvarians. In the middle of the picture- the opening engagement- A brigade of Prussians and Hanoverians attack a brigade of Swiss and Germans holding the small village of Eyne.

Getting it ready- an intriguing battle!

 Gaming has been a bit thin on the ground recently, and I haven't had the chance to put anything on the blog- life getting in the way of all the important stuff! That was until very recently when I managed to get a few in (Reports to follow!). Additionally, with a few spare days and an itch that needed to be scratched, I had always wanted to have a crack at what I always felt was Marlborough's most unusual battle: Oudenarde July 11 1708.

It was unusual in that it was not a planned battle and involved a river crossing ( in two places!) as the French Commander, Vendome, scrambled to deal with Marlborough and Eugene's crossing and the battle that unfolded was a fascinating tactical situation.

How to do it on the table?

With both armies consisting of over 90 battalions each and 130 squadrons, I had nowhere near that- and most of my OOB was for other battles. Undaunted I decided to give it a go. I figured that I could do a 3:1 ration for the infantry and 4:1 for the cavalry- about 25-30 battalions a side and 30+ squadrons a side. The proportion wasn't quite correct but I was using everything suitable that I had. So it was a 'bathtubbing' exercise which reflected some of the tactical nuances of the battle but not really a recreation of it. 

Terrain was essential so I decided to scratch build it. I needed to represent the Scheldt river and the town of Oudenarde where the Allied army crossed over and the heights above the town that were fought over by the armies on the day. 

My go to book for this one!